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Updated: May 24, 2025
"No," he replied, "like the life of the rich would be thy life but there is no hope of immortality." Maitreyî said that she had no need of what would not make her immortal. Yâjñavalkya proceeded to explain to her his doctrine of the Âtman, the self or essence, the spirit present in man as well as in the universe. "Not for the husband's sake is the husband dear but for the sake of the Âtman.
But the anecdotes respecting the Buddha and women, whether his wife or others, are not touched with sentiment, not even so much as is found in the conversation between Yâjñavalkya and Maitreyî in the Upanishad. To women as a class he gave their due and perhaps in his own opinion more than their due, but if he felt any interest in them as individuals, the sacred texts have obliterated the record.
Since the conversation between Yajnavalkya and Maitreyi occurs in almost the same form in two collections, it probably once existed as an independent piece. In Buddhist literature the composite and tertiary character of the Sutta Pitaka is equally plain. The various Nikayas are confessedly collections of discourses.
The early Upanishads relate without disapproval how kings such as Ajâtaśatru of Kâśi, Pravâhaṇa Jaivali and Aśvapati Kaikeya imparted to learned Brahmans philosophical and theological knowledge previously unknown to them and even women like Gârgî and Maitreyî took part in theological discussions.
One is from the Bṛihad-Âraṇyaka and relates how Yâjñavalkya, when about to retire to the forest as an ascetic, wished to divide his property between his two wives, Kâtyâyanî "who possessed only such knowledge as women possess" and Maitreyî "who was conversant with Brahman." The latter asked her husband whether she would be immortal if she owned the whole world.
'That Self, he continues, 'is to be expressed as not so, not so! That means He, the highest Lord, different in nature from everything else, whether sentient or non-sentient, abides within all beings as their Self, and hence is not touched by the imperfections of what constitutes his body merely. He then concludes, 'Whereby should he know the Knower? Thus, O Maitreyi, thou hast been instructed.
Nothing, says Yâjñavalkya, has any value, meaning, or indeed reality except in relation to this Self . The whole world including the Vedas and religion is an emanation from him. The passage at which Maitreyî expresses her bewilderment is obscure, but the reply is more definite.
It is a perfect misery to be kept bound up with things lesser than ourselves. This it is that Maitreyi felt when her husband gave her his property on the eve of leaving home. She asked him, "Would these material things help one to attain the highest?" or, in other words, "Are they more than my soul to me?"
Here Maitreyî professes herself bewildered but Yâjñavalkya continues "I say nothing bewildering. Verily, beloved, that Âtman is imperishable and indestructible. When there is as it were duality, then one sees the other, one tastes the other, one salutes the other, one hears the other, one touches the other, one knows the other.
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